Merits and demerits of asp.net web site

[Guest]

Hi all,

We have a website which has some html(static), asp(pages with forms) and
some .aspx (pages with forms) pages. Can someone tell me the advantages of
having the entire website in .aspx vs having static pages as html, and pages
with forms in either asp/asp.net. One idea behind converting static html
pages to .aspx was to take advantage of master pages once .net v2 final is
released this year.

What I am seeking are the advantage/disadvantages of template based html
site vs .aspx pages. The content of pages is stored with the pages and not in
database.

Thanks in advance

Joe

 

[Max]

I would wait for v2. The "master pages" idea looks promising. The way it is
now, "includes" don't do it for me. I can have a header & footer, but when
layout changes occur, every page needs to be changed (VS.NET won't let you
have an "include" with a partially drawn table).

What I use now is Dreamweaver templates. All the pages are ASPX now, with an
"order form" that actually does some dynamic work. But most of the pages are
just using client side templates in Dreamweaver, because it's easier. Don't
use codebehind with DW though, because DW and VS.NET do NOT play nice with
each other. I don't load up my order form in DW at all.

For dynamic content, think about what you're wanting to do -- if it's a
changing list of products, customers, or maybe articles that you want to
search and sort through, then database driven content is ideal. If you're
just loading up static content that doesn't change and doesn't need
searched, then there's no reason to move that into a database. Just put it
directly on the page.

-Max

 

[Guest]

Max, can you explain what do you mean by VS.NET won't let you have an
"include" with a partially drawn table?

I was under impression that you can have say vertical navigation placed in
master pages besides header and footer.

So should I just change the file extension from .html to .aspx and once .net
2 final is out then I can consider using master pages without changing
filenames.

Thanks,

Joe

 

[Max]

Basically what I'm saying is that you have user controls (in ASP they were
called "includes"), that you can place on every page. Change that control,
and it affects every page. VS.NET gets mad if you make a table without the
close tags, but you can get around it by not opening it in design view (but
then you don't have design view to work with).

In a vertical nav bar site, you'd make a user control with the navigation,
but every page would still need to be designed with a two column table (the
left column is where you'd drag the nav control into). Using CSS allows you
to make global design changes to that table, but you still have to create
that two column table on every single page.

I think you'll have to recreate all your pages to use master templates,
which should only be a lot of copy and pasting. I'm not exactly sure how
they will be implemented, but ideally you would create a master template and
define spaces for content to go. Then you create a page like
companyinfo.aspx and tell VS you want it to use a template. It then displays
your new page in design view which would look like the master template with
spaces you can put content or code into. The rest of the page would not be
editable, since they technically aren't really there, they are elements in
the master template.

*hoping that's how it will go*

-Max